Quoted from Brijam:Yeah, no. You're being quite simplistic... and rather biased. The situation is far more complex.
For one thing, we don't even have the ability manufacture a lot of these goods. LED panels for example. Take Vizio, a US-based company, production has always been in Taiwan or China. They're simply not made here.
So let's say we jack the tariffs up so high that we can afford to spin up plants in the USA. Great, we are now paying 10x for goods produced locally. Think about the collateral damage and the end results. Businesses that rely on imported steel, install solar roofs, sell electronics will have to raise their prices. Those costs get passed straight to the consumer, and if the consumer can't or won't pay the higher cost, production drops and jobs are lost. Oh yeah, this impacts retail consumers too. Do you really want to pay $3,000 for your next phone?
You state that "American made products are more expensive due to higher priced labor and heavy regulations" which is very narrow. Of course it costs much more to live in the USA so we have to pay people more. But we're certainly overturning those regulations that keep our air and water clean, though! Soon we'll be able to compete with China and enjoy the same smog levels as Beijing, where the last time I visited the AQI was /literally/ off the chart at 999+, where 300 is the maximum bad.
The reality is much more complex. CEO's absurdly high salaries, American corporate waste (the insanely high cost of advertising, for example), and ever-increasing healthcare costs are at least as much of a factor why we can't compete with a Chinese LED panel.
Another thing to consider: what do we really gain from making LED panels in the USA? Oh yeah, the government would gain. That's where the tariff money would go. Not a particularly free market move, though.
In addition we'd gain a few jobs, but not many. Making LED panels is a heavily automated process.
A similar set of stupid is behind the effort to reignite coal. Coal is more expensive than solar or wind, and it also spews radioactivity and toxic fumes in the air and is very dangerous to mine. The industry should be allowed to die, because it doesn't make any sense any more. What's next, whaling for oil?
My last point for now, China and everyone else we hit with tariffs will just impose them on us. We're still a massive, massive exporter. More jobs lost.
I've not even scratched the surface. Trade wars benefit nobody.
Policies of this board prohibit me from discussing the real reasons behind these tariffs, but they should be glaringly obvious.Others including me, yeah. And I think you vastly underestimate the capacity of Thailand, Taiwan, India, Costa Rica, etc etc etc etc etc to produce cheap high quality goods.
I didn't know we had an expert in world trade here, from Portlandia no less! Looks like you even took the time to educate all us fools on coal, CEO salaries, healthcare, and air quality. I feel so enlightened!
If the sky was falling, like your rants allude to, the stock market would be a good indicator of that. At this point, my portfolio is fat and happy and the economy continues to set records. We'll see where this leads, but the people betting seem to be cautiously optimistic despite the changes to trade.